The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1887-09-29

THE VAGAB0ED AND THE AUS
TRALIAN MAIL SERVICE,

Mr. Julian Thomas a well known
writer under the non de plume OF ''The
Vagabond," and who passed through
here about a year ago, has a letter in the
Sydney Daily Telegraph of September
I'd on ocean mail subsidies, in which he
speaks of the San Francisco mail service
and the offer of the Canadian Pacific
railway to carry Australian and New
Zealand mails. He SAYS:
If the Canadians wish US to do business
with them they must show that they can
do it on profitable terms-to ourselves. If
the offer of the Canadian Pacific Railway
Company to carry Australian and New
Zealand mails is to be entertained we must
be convinced that Canada offers a better
route than the United States, and that it is
worth while to subsidise the powerful cor
poration which, from Montreal to Bur
rar1s Inlet, has a controlling interest in
the direction of affairs in the Dominion.
The Canadian Pacific Railway Company
has the greatest monopoly IN the world, a
monopoly which we learn from recent dis
patches is to be upheld by force of arms If
the people of Manitoba attempt to run
new railway to the United States border
and trade with their nei ghbors, instead of
with the far away provinces of Ontario
and Quebec
As one who has travelled much by the va
Tious railway routes across the American
continent, and having specially studied this
question from Australian point of view
during my journey through Canada last
year, | affirm that the Canadian-Pacihc
route Is decidedly not far more reliable
and swifter than the American route
After going on to compare the two
routes in a business light, he speaks of
the present service as follows:
The present mail route via America
commences at Queenstown and thence over
the. Atlantic Ocean to New York. New
Zealand and Australian letters are there
carried on the swiftest steamers in the world
by the safest possible ocean route: for when
one considers the enormous traffic between
Cape Clear and Sandy Hook the accidents
have been but small percentage. By va
nous railroads connecting with the Pacific
railroads at Omaha the mails in six davs
reach San Francisco, where one of Messrs.
Spreo kels boats is waiting, with steam I'D.
70 take the bags on board and com nence
one OF the pleasantest ocean voyages mag
inable, and / speak as one having the an !
thorlty OF experience. DO not think there
are faster or swlfter vessels out of Austria /
liza than the MaripOsa AMI Alameda. Ger |
tainly you viii not I'D nicer or more
officers than those American gen
tlemen who Command and serve on Messrs.
SprecEels steamers. Ny trip last year in
the Mariposa will always be remembered
by me with unalloyed pleasure The hole
contract time from LONDON TO Sydney is
forty days, ADD the mails have often been
in few hours over thirty-efgbt |
days. The contract time from San Fran
cisco IS twenty-five days, and the VOYAGE |
has often been com pleted in twentv-three
days There IS no question. however, that
the Brlnd.si Route Is the quickest, but the
great adv antAge OF an alternate route across
the Pacific IS that in time of war, when the
European railways would be blocked and
Egypt perhaps again turned into q cockpit
TOR other nations to fight in, we should all
ways nave open communication with the
mother country This advantage i in
creased thousand-fold by the present serv
ice. The American flag in time of war
would be protection to our mails and to
Australian passengers"
MIR. Thomas does not think the Cana /
iian-Pacitic route offers an advantage to
this. He states that the
'oyage from Liverpool to Quebec is one
II the most dangerous across the Allan
&c, and though the railway Journey is
shorter from Quebec to Burrard's Inlet
han through the United States, it is GER !
-aiEiy not safer. He had passed over the
canadian railway, but would not like TO